Various attempts have already been made to produce a skiing surface for use during the snow-free months, particularly such a surface made of plastic, the properties of which permit the use of winter skiing techniques without difficulty and which do not require retraining of the skier for a different skiing technique.
A skiing surface, such as one made of fiber bundles, as German Pat. No. 1,047,088 discloses, has the disadvantage in that in addition to rapid wearing down of the fibers due to high friction between the skis and the fibers, positive control of the skis is not possible.
The use of an elastic bottom layer of rubber with a top layer secured thereon according to the German laid-open patent application No. 2,041,046 has also proved to be unsuitable, since here, as well, besides other disadvantages, positive control of the skis is not possible. The same is true of the subject of the laid-open German patent application No. 22 55 641. A brush layer according to the laid-open German patent application No. 1,578,758, which has rows of bristles affixed uniformly onto a foundation layer, also does not produce the desired properties for smooth skiing. Glide needles as in laid-open German patent application No. 2,437,267 disclose no possibility of means for ski control such as is required in downhill skiing. Many glide surfaces of this type are subject to excessive heat as a result of friction and therefore to an unacceptable amount of wear.